US rig count drop continues, down 1 to 802

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

Baker Hughes reports the number of rigs drilling for oil and natural gas in the U.S. continued to fall Thanksgiving week, with the count issued Wednesday Nov. 27, rather than Thursday, because of the holiday. The short week count was 802, down one from the previous week, and followed drops of three, 11, five, eight and 21 the previous five weeks.

In its weekly rig count the Houston oilfield services company said the active rig count was down 274 from 1,076 active rigs a year ago.

The company reported that 668 rigs targeted oil (down three from the previous week; down 219 from a year ago) and 131 targeted natural gas (up two from the previous week; down 58 from a year ago). There were three miscellaneous rigs active (unchanged from the previous week and up by three from a year ago).

The company said 53 of the U.S. holes were directional, 701 were horizontal and 48 were vertical.

Alaska was up two rigs from the previous week; Louisiana was up by one rig.

Rig counts in all other states were either unchanged or down by one.

The rig counts in California, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Utah and West Virginia were unchanged from the previous week.

In Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Wyoming rig counts were down by one from the previous week. Texas, with the most active rigs in the country, had a count of 405.

Baker Hughes shows Alaska with seven rigs active for the short week ending Nov. 27, up one from a year ago.

The U.S. rig count peaked at 4,530 in 1981. It bottomed out in May 2016 at 404.

- KRISTEN NELSON